2.08.2008

To Jack After the Valentine's Disco...

Dear Jack,Last night when I got home from work you were ready and waiting in your 'smart clothes' and excited beyond all reason. I was going to drive you to school where they were hosting a Valentine's Disco for you and all the other 4-6 year olds. I had been forewarned by your Daddy, who had made a similar trek with you to the 'Halloween Disco' in October, that this was pretty much an hour of complete and utter insanity. Good lord, was he right. When we got to school we couldn't get in right away, so you went careening around outside the doors aping at the other children and admiring the boys in their Cyberman shirts.

It doesn't matter if you know a kid, if they are impressive to you, then you'll head right up to them and say 'Nice shirt!' I don't know if it's their englishness or the fact that you can perhaps stun people into silence, but they normally don't react very openly, but when you turn away from them I see a slight smile of pride as they look down at themselves.

Meanwhile, you have your own little cohort of friends, and once we got inside the building you all had a marvelous time 'dancing' (and I use that term loosely) and piling onto one another in great heaps. Before I had boys I was very much on the 'nurture' side of the debate, but watching you and your pals say hello by wrestling one another to the floor makes me seriously wonder, and this creeping realization is only heightened by the fact that as you writhe on the floor all around you are pretty little girls in red and pink valentine's dresses, dancing much more skillfully to the beat.

For you the disco is about hurtling around the room with your friends but mainly it's about the Sweeties. Over to the side of the hall was a little shop selling packets of chews and gummies -- you are drawn to this place irresistibly over the course of the hour. Spinning off to tumble and then every few moments returning to beg for more sweets, more 10 pence pieces to buy them. "But puh-leeeeease, Mummy."

After about 4 packets, I had to put my foot down.

All that sugar and running around, and you got completely overheated. You were begging me to let you take your clothes off, which was something new and also somewhat alarming. Rather than draw such unwanted and dodgy attention on ourselves (I imagined you chasing around the hall in your spongebob undies) we opted to roll up your sleeves and trouser legs, and you reared off again with your pale legs poking out like sticks.

Finally you returned back to my side, and asked to go home. You happily place your hand in mine as we work our way out. That simple hand-holding. I wonder how long I have left of that.I'm not being maudlin or anything, because I know that it's only natural that one day soon you'll be less likely to hug me on a whim or plant a wet kiss on my cheek, but it's also good for me to remember that one day I'll be looking at this time and wondering where it went.

Aaah - how lovely! At the other end of the spectrum, I had to accompany my almost 15 year old daughter somewhere on Saturday night. I was abandoned almost immediately (having paid the entrance fees) and "encouraged" to go home and pick her up in a couple of hours. Half way home, (actually relieved to be let go) she must have had remorse pangs as she rang me to "see if I was okay". Perhaps she thought I was crying!

Oh, he will kiss you for years but not in public after a bit. I remember this with my little brother but now he is pretty much a man and he still wants the love. Just not in front of the other boys.

A sweet cuddly boy really does grow into a sweet cuddly man if all goes as it should.

Right now, my daughter's affection is OUT OF CONTROL. She literally hangs on me like a monkey and plants horrendous juicy kisses on me for hours and hours. I have to pay attention or at some point I will disentangle her from me like a cat you put off your lap. But yes, I think like you do: OK, you are going to hate me at some point so I'm enjoying this now even if it is difficult to move from place to place with you attached to my body.

What a sweet and wonderful letter. I feel the same way about my little boy, he's six and full of more energy than I could possibly imagine. The wrestling and rough housing he does with his friends always alarms me, my husband always says "it's normal, that's how I always acted with my friends and brothers" it's so completely foreign to me as I grew up with one sister. He still loves to cuddle and give hugs,it's so bittersweet to know it won't last much longer.Thanks for putting my thoughts into words...can't wait to see my boy and give him a big hug.

Oh! I wish they had dance parties here for younger kids! That sounds so fun.

And what a sweetie...it's the cliche of cliches to say that it all goes by too fast, and yet I can't be reminded of it enough. I want to wallow in each moment, and yet the mundane keeps calling me away, and I need this post...I keep needing this post....

What a lovely post! I'll be thinking of it when I see littlun careening around the upcoming family wedding dancefloors performing his best twists n' shakes; all the rellies will be overjoyed to see him doing the same.

These post is really very lovely. . When we got to school we couldn't get in right away, so you went careening around outside the doors aping at the other children and admiring the boys in their Cyberman shirts.